


For Better or Worse

by Angelina_Aintithenniel



Series: The Cottage at the End of the Lane [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crowley Was Raphael Before He Fell (Good Omens), Crowley Whump (Good Omens), Demon Summoning, Domestic Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Footnotes, Hastur may or may not still be stalking Crowley, Hurt Aziraphale (Good Omens), Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Ineffable Idiots (Good Omens), Protective Aziraphale (Good Omens), Protective Crowley (Good Omens), Snake Crowley (Good Omens), South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-08-08
Packaged: 2020-07-19 05:27:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19968763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angelina_Aintithenniel/pseuds/Angelina_Aintithenniel
Summary: In which Crowley gets summoned, angels attack, and Aziraphale defends their home. Also starring: a cottage garden, an old church, and a Register’s Office wedding.OrIt really was too good to last.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 2 of The Cottage at the End of the Lane series. Can be read as stand-alone or paired with Part 1: In the New Beginning. Mostly just wanted an excuse to write cute and awkward weddings (and torture Crowley some).

In the South Downs sits a cottage. It’s the type of cottage one would expect to find in East Sussex: small and homely and possessing a well-kept, if somewhat scruffy, garden. And while it always gives a pleasant, well lived-in feeling to passersby, an observant individual would note that it is only ever occupied on weekends and certain bank holidays. It would take a truly occult observer, however, to realize that it was, in fact, the home of an angel and a demon.

Most of the neighbors were, therefore, completely oblivious to the supernatural couple that lived in the cottage. But that didn’t mean that they remained untouched by it’s presence. 

“I tell you,” a jogger said to her friend as they trotted past the cottage at the end of the lane. “Something’s wrong with that place.” 

“It’s too perfect. That’s what it is,” the other jogger agreed. 

The first jogger turned onto the well-worn footpath that lead down into the neighborhood. “And the men who live there are queer in more than one sense of the word.”

“I know,” said the other jogger. “John over on Cherry Street said he saw the tall, lanky one hissing at his garden. Actually _hissing_. And he never takes off his sunglasses, even when he’s inside.” 

They rounded the corner of Blackthorn cottage and eased up their pace to walk out onto Marble lane just in time for the door of the cottage to sweep open. 

“Oh, there they are.” the second jogger mumbled to the first. They smiled painfully to the men, trying to look like they hadn’t just had a good gossip. “Nice day, isn’t it?”

“It is,” the shorter of the two men answered, pausing to inhale blissfully. “It is a lovely, lovely day.”

“Come on, angel” the tall man took the first by his elbow. “I promised to get you to the church on time.”

“Of course, my dear, of course,” the first man replied. “Have a nice day.” He waved to the joggers, climbed into the car next to who they could only assume was his partner, and sped out of the lane, waving the whole way. Something went with him, maybe it was the idea of home or perhaps it was the feeling of the morning sun across your face. 

“Odd lot, them,” the first jogger commented before turning into her front walk without another word. 

* * *

This is Aziraphale: short, wrapped in a camel hair coat that looked to be a reproduction of a much older style,[1] with a light blue waistcoat that accented his light blue eyes perfectly. His generally unkempt blonde curls had been tamed into something that might have passed for a hairstyle had it been 70 years earlier. He stood next to a tall man dressed in a much more modern attire of black and grey with red curls bouncing around his shoulders. They presented an unusual picture standing side by side on the imposing stairs of a Register’s office, almost a study in contrasts. One would even say that they fundamentally clashed.

This was about to change. 

* * *

"Well, let's get on with it," Crowley said, taking a deep breath. 

"We don't have to do this," Aziraphale spoke suddenly and the hand held in his tensed.

Without turning around to face him Crowley asked in a voice that was lighthearted in tone but not intent, "Not getting cold feet, are you?" 

"Oh! Oh, no. Nothing of the sort," the angel stammered, quick to reassure. "I simply meant we don't have to do just this. We could have a proper ceremony or a reception. Or even just a civil union."

"I like it this way. It's such a human thing to do, creating efficient ways to join and dissolve marriages. Very much an _our side_ idea." This time Crowley did turn to him, glasses slipping just far enough down his nose to expose slitted eyes that held a breathtaking fondness in them. "But I was thinking, maybe we could have a garden party after? Invite the Armageddon gang?"

"That sounds lovely, my dear." Aziraphale smiled and pulled his soon-to-be husband into the office.

As far as these things went, it was a relatively short ceremony. Neither had wanted anything ostentatious or, considering Crowley’s aversion to churches, overly religious. So they had settled on a simple, civil ceremony. The two witnesses they managed to Will into waiting around for the ten minutes it took them to sign the registry had no clue why they were there in the first place and, afterwards, had no memory of who the two smiling men were. But they were happy for them nonetheless. “Ah, young love” one had whispered to the other, not realizing that they couldn’t have been more wrong.

Barely 30 minutes later, the angel and demon were sat in a garishly pink tea room, nibbling away at tiny pastries, delectable scones, and those little tea sandwiches that Crowley was loathe to admit he loved. Soft strains of classical music drifted through the room from a set of low quality speakers masquerading as rocks in the garden full of artificial plants. 

“Champagne?” Aziraphale asked, holding up the bottle that he had smuggled past the hostess. 

Crowley materialized a pair of flutes that had seconds ago been disused tea cups from the table next to theirs. The angel eyed him reproachfully, but still poured the wine. 

“To us?” the demon proposed, raising his flute. 

“To us.”

They toasted their new marriage. Crowley held his flute close to his chest as he savored the flavor and the unusual emotion that twisted his stomach into knots. It felt odd to think that after everything that had occurred over the last 6000 years, he got a happy ending. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be for demons. He had Fallen, and quite spectacularly so; he was destined for an eternity of damnation without relief. Yet here he was, seated across from the angel he had grown to love. And wasn’t that a slap in the face to the Great Plan? He was a demon and he _loved_. So much for nature over nurture. 

There were several horribly sentimental things that Crowley wanted to say in that moment of simple happiness with his life partner, like: _I love you_ or _you’ve been my world_ or _I’m glad we get this chance_. But what the demon managed to squeak out was instead: “Is this a 1928 Krug?”[2]

Aziraphale hummed in answer, “I picked up a few bottles before the markets went south. Been saving them for a special occasion.” 

“Right,” Crowley nodded. “And this is a _special_ occasion right enough. I honestly can’t believe we got away with this.”

The angel popped a small powdered biscuit into his mouth and shrugged. He dabbed at the corner of his lips with his handkerchief before responding, “I’m surprised as well. Maybe our former sides are being true to their word and leaving us alone.”

“I hope that’s all it is,” Crowley mumbled. “It’d be unfortunate if they decided to come after us now.” 

“Best not to think about it,” Aziraphale soothed, reaching over to clasp Crowley’s hand. “Besides, it’s our wedding day. Let’s enjoy the moment we have.”

“I swear to this Earth, if you quote another musical-”

“Then what?” the angel giggled, cutting him off.

“Then I won’t take you to see Rome for our anniversary,” Crowley threatened. It was an empty threat, but his angel didn’t need to know that. 

“Rome?” 

“I thought we’d go see the sites. Get some oysters.” 

“Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale’s fond smile was blinding. “That sounds wonderful.”

* * *

“Are you really going to force me to carry you over this threshold?” Crowley asked, one eyebrow in danger of disappearing into his hairline from how high it had quirked up in disbelief. 

“It’s tradition!” Aziraphale pouted. 

The angel and the demon stood before the open front door of their cottage, in the middle of a battle of wills. The flowers lining the front walk watched the contest with interest. 

“Tradition,” Crowley scoffed. “We’ve been cohabiting for months. I think tradition went right out the window a long time ago.” 

“Could you humor me? Just this once.”

“I’m not doing it.”

“Fine, then I shall have to carry you.”

Crowley backed away, hands held up in defence, “don’t you dare!”

He managed to dodge the first lunge, but not the second. “Angel!” the demon screeched in indignation as he was hauled over Aziraphale’s shoulders. 

“Stop squirming or I might drop you!”

“Heaven forbid,” Crowley teased, but kept still as Aziraphale stepped over the threshold and entered their home. The demon immediately wriggled out from his husband’s arms and straightened out his clothes. “Happy now?”

“Hmm,” Aziraphale hummed in a way that clearly meant yes. 

They stood in the entryway, looking around the tidy sitting room for something to focus on. For the first time in a long time, neither the angel nor the demon knew what to say. Frankly, Crowley was stumped on what one did directly following their wedding. He was, of course, explicitly aware that humans tended to make their coupling official in the biological sense shortly after they had made it official in the legal sense,[3] but the effort that required had never seemed worth it to the demon. He glanced over at the angel shifting from foot to foot next to him, wondering if he should address this last thought, before deciding that it was a topic better left to another day. 

Crowley shrugged out of his jacket and hung it in its proper place next to Aziraphale’s on the hall stand. “Why don’t I fix up a space in the garden for us and you make that pesto dish you’re so fond of? Maybe open a second bottle of that champagne with dinner?”

Aziraphale smiled, looking grateful to have something to do, “I think that just might work.” 

The demon smiled at the retreating back of his angel before ducking out into the garden, already planning what he wanted to do with the rest of the space. Some giddy sense of happiness deep inside him that his demonic nature hadn’t quite managed to tamp down unfolded on the garden before Crowley could stop it. 

Aziraphale tactfully didn’t comment on the sudden appearance of numerous orchids, a carpet of peacock feathers, or the black swan paddling with bemusement around a small fountain that had appeared out of nowhere. He was sure Crowley could set it all right again before the end of the evening.

* * *

"So this is it?" The smartly dressed men asked the tight faced woman beside him.

"This is where the coordinates led," the woman answered.

The man glared at the white cottage in the photograph. "And we're certain it's his?"

"If our informants are to be trusted, then yes, Gabriel this is it," the woman replied. She laid several more images on the table. "Our agents haven't been able to get a clear shot of him, but they did see his demon there."

Gabriel looked through the pictures with a pinched expression. "He gave up all of heaven for _this_?! A pet demon and a country cottage?"

No one answered him.

“Gone native he has,” Sandalphon offered after a moment. 

“No,” Gabriel disagreed, steepled fingers held close to his lips as if they could hold back the flood of curses he desperately wanted to let loose. “This is something more. This is tantamount to betrayal of Heaven.”

“Oh, it’s betrayal alright,” Uriel announced as she strode in holding another bundle of photographs. She dumped the pictures on the table, spreading them out so the other archangels who crowded around could see. A smiling Aziraphale looked out at them from the still frame, hand in hand with Crowley as they bounded up a set of stairs. 

“The Earth Observation Department just flagged these in the files. The Principality married the demon known as Anthony J Crowley today in a government building of all things,” Uriel spat out the words as if they were acid on her tongue. “I’m not sure if we should be grateful or insulted that he didn’t even involve the church.”

“This is much worse than I thought,” Gabriel shifted through the pictures, watching his former agent cavort around with the Enemy in crisp black and white images. "Is everything ready, Michael?"

"Just waiting for the signal."

“Good,” his fist thumped into the table to emphasize the point. “We move as soon as we get it. Heaven will not stand for this mockery.”

* * *

Far below, in the cottage at the end of the lane, a demon lay tucked in his bed, memories of fire and burning books plaguing his dreams. Crowley shifted to his side, a frown tugging at his lips. Even in his unconscious thoughts, the demon realized that it had been months since he had last dreamed and that something was very, very wrong. And then he was gone with a small _pop_ as air rushed in to fill the vacuum of space he had just occupied. 

The angel that lay next to him slept on, oblivious. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1Had the observer noting this looked closer, they would have realized that it wasn’t a reproduction at all, rather had been kept in pristine condition since its creation 180 years ago.[return to text]  
> 2For those undiscerning connoisseurs and non-Sommeliers among us, a 1928 Krug is an incredibly expensive wine famed for its flavor and price. If you are one of the unlucky legions working in entry-level retail positions, it could cost you nearly a year’s salary. But for an immortal angel and demon, price didn’t matter. [return to text]  
> 3Or before a legal union, possibly even before an official relationship of any form if his years of experience were anything to go by. [return to text]


	2. Chapter 2

Crowley snapped into being on a cold, stone-paved floor, suddenly wide awake. It took a moment for his head to clear and his atoms to adjust to not only being reassembled but also locked into this form. Before he even opened his eyes, Crowley knew what had happened. He had been summoned and bound; in a church, no less, judging by the feel of the dull burn that spread throughout the points where his body came in contact with the floor. 

The demon’s eyes fluttered open, feeling naked without their usual cover. As he expected, an old church swam into focus. Old wasn’t quite the word that Crowley would have used had he been in his right mind and not still nursing the hangover that being ripped through space and time at someone else’s Will invariably caused. No, medieval was the word he would have used. And he would have called the church so in the tone of voice one generally reserved for words like  _ taxes  _ or  _ audit  _ or any of the other unnecessary corporate terms.[1]

The church was indeed a medieval remnant with its stained glass windows rising to meet a vaulted ceiling. Crowley was lying in the middle of the crossing with high, mahogany choir stalls on one side and modern wooden pews on the other. If he focused hard enough, the demon could just make out the notice board at the end of the nave which announced the progress towards the roof fund. 

Movement in the transept behind Crowley caught his attention and the demon rose as gracefully as his sore body would allow to meet what he assumed would be a bunch of foolhardy teenagers who fancied themselves occultists or possibly an overzealous rector. 

“Congratulations, you succeeded at a basic summoning. Now, what do you want? As you can see from the pyjamas, I was in the middle of something very impor-” Crowley trailed off as he came face-to-face with an Archangel.

“Demon Crawly,” Sandalphon’s voice weaseled out of him to echo in the still church. The Archangel circled around the captive demon, keeping a safe distance from the summoning circle that trapped him. 

“That’s just great,” Crowley huffed, casually shifting from one foot to another. “You know, I have a telephone. Three, in fact. Could’ve tried one of those first.” 

Sandalphon cocked his head to the side as he visibly parsed Crowley’s statement. “Ah, yes, I believe the humans refer to that as sarcasm?”

“No kidding,” Crowley snarked back before he could stop himself, mouth leaping out ahead of his brain. 

But the Archangel missed his tone entirely, turning to beckon to someone behind him. A tall man, nearly the opposite to Sandalphon in every way, strode out from the shadows. He wore the unmistakable robes of a vicar, and clasped a small book in his hands. Crowley’s senses were too muddled by the presence of so many holy auras to figure out if the small book was a Bible or something else. 

All three stood men in a tense silence, broken only by the steady drip of water against stone somewhere in the ambulatory. Ah, Crowley thought, so that was the reason for the roof fund. 

The demon was, predictably, the first to break the stillness. “So, are you going to tell me why I’m or here or do I get three guesses?”

Neither Sandalphon or the young man rose to the bait. The vicar opened the book at another gesture from the Archangel, leafing through to stop at a dog-eared page. 

“You do realize this is my wedding night, right? There are other things - other angels - I should be doing right now,” Crowley spat out incredulously. He had been hoping for the taunt to surprise Sandalphon, but steely resignation was the only emotion that flashed through the golden eyes of the angel. And, oh shit, they knew. They knew Aziraphale had married a demon. If they already knew about the wedding and only one of the Archangels had come to summon him, how much danger did that leave Aziraphale in?

The demon cleared his throat, rocking back on his heels to give his bare toes a reprieve from the burning touch of consecrated ground. “Where’re the rest of your gal pals?” he had been trying for nonchalant, but his voice came out a little bit too breathy to convince anyone that he wasn’t fishing for information. 

This time Sandalphon did react, smiling widely at the trapped demon. “They are otherwise occupied detaining a renegade angel.”

Crowley knew it was a taunt, but something inside of him snapped possessively nonetheless, not  _ his  _ angel. A low growl escaped his throat before he could clamp down on the rush of emotion, “Don’t you dare touch him!”

Sandalphon laughed, “The Principality Aziraphale, Angel of the Eastern Gate is currently AWOL from his post and is being recalled to stand trial for his crimes, as the customs and laws of the Heavenly Host demands. There is nothing you can do to stop us.”

“What crimes?!” Crowley couldn’t help the urge to roll his eyes. Crimes indeed, the only crimes that the Principality could be guilty of was his deplorable taste in fashion and his sometimes alarming craving for anything with carbs in it. 

“I believe they will start the charge list with lusting after a demon and violating the institution of marriage.”

“Where have you been?” Crowley snorted indignantly. “People have been doing that since the very beginning.”

“Be that as it may, marriage was meant for those made in the Almighty’s image. Not for an angel and certainly not for a demon,” Sandalphon replied.

Crowley muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like  _ arse _ before falling silent. He glared at the Archangel, daring him with a malevolent glint in his eye to say anything more on the subject.

Movement at the periphery of his vision distracted Crowley and he glanced out of the corner of his eye at the vicar as the young man sent Sandalphon a questioning look. The Archangel nodded once and the vicar reached into the recesses of his robes to withdraw a rosary. With the book still clutched in one hand, the young man raised his rosary and brandished it at Crowley. The demon realized what was about to happen a moment before it did. 

“Can I at least challenge you to a game of chess, or riddles, or-”[2] Crowley was cut off by the quiet murmurings of latin that felt like a hammer to the back of his head. “Guess not.”

He sucked in noisy breath between clenched teeth. It had been at least 300 years since someone had last tried to exorcise the demon - The Enlightenment had been a much needed windfall - and he had almost forgotten how much they hurt. The pain began as a familiar pulsating behind his eyes, the type he got if Aziraphale had dragged one too many holy books into his Bentley, but Crowley knew from experience that it was just going to get more painful from there. 

Smoke curled off of the demon in wisps, an alarming grey pallor settling into his normally flawless skin. There was a keening sound gathering in the back of his throat, but Crowley trapped it with a sharp inhale, chewing on the inside of his cheek instead. He stood rigid against the building pain with knees locked and brow furrowed into a visible snarl. The arm wrapped around his stomach was the only sign of weakness that he let slip through. 

“My, my” Sandalphon tutted with a small laugh. “You are a resilient bastard, aren’t you? I can see why they assigned you to Earth.” 

“Just doing my part for the Ineffable Plan,” Crowley tried to snark, but a groan swallowed his last few words. 

Sandalphon didn’t rise to the demon’s taunt and settled back to watch the proceedings, a smug smile tugging at the corner of his lips. Crowley glowered at him, shoving both hands into his pockets and trying his best to ignore the pounding headache that enveloped the entirety of his skull. Instead, the demon focused on the pain of his feet against consecrated ground, shifting from side to side as the burning intensified. 

“Look, padre,” Crowley tried to suppress the rising pain at the vicar’s words. “I’m not sure what he’s told you, but I’m not actually possessing anything. Your little exorcism isn’t going to do anything more than make me mad.” 

The vicar hesitated a moment, glancing back at Sandalphon. The Archangel glared, not taking his eyes off of Crowley as he waved for the vicar to continue. “We just need to keep you occupied long enough to deal with a small personnel matter, and then you’ll be a free demon for however long it takes the Adversary to catch up with you; which I can’t imagine will be much time at all.”

“Why not just smite me now?” Crowley bit out past the pain of the exorcism, ignoring the priest as his chanting built in volume. He didn’t want to taunt the Archangel into ending his life, but he was curious to a fault and this was an unusual situation to say the least. “I seem to recall that was your specialty what with the whole Sodom and Gomorrah, fire and brimstone, er, thing.”

Sandalphon smiled nastily, the flecks of pure gold that clung to his teeth glinting in the light. “It would please me greatly to end your sorry existence, demon Crawly. But your life and death belong to hell and I hear they are excited to welcome you back into the fold, so to speak.”

A cry of pain escaped Crowley as the vicar hit a steady rhythm, speaking with more and more confidence. He cast about the space, trying to piece together an escape plan even as he ran his mouth, “I’m curious, what exactly are you going to do with a demon immune to Holy Water and an angel immune to Hellfire?”

“Not immune to discorporation,” the archangel smiled terribly. “We’ve reserved an eternal prayer room in Heaven for your boyfriend and I’m sure Hell will give you a burning welcome.”

“Husband!” the demon snapped through gritted teeth. If they were going to torture him, the least they could do was get the reason why he was being subjected to this correct. “Violating the institution of marriage, remember?”

That had been the wrong thing to say, Crowley realized as both the Archangel and vicar flinched. Sandalphon’s eyes blazed coldly and he snapped his fingers. The pain of the exorcism became overwhelming as the Grace of an Archangel joined the Intent of the vicar, searing through the spaces between his bound electrons like liquid fire. With a scream of pain, Crowley was driven to his hands and knees inside the summoning circle, back arching against the white hot pain that seared up his spine. His vision began to white out and his hearing narrowed until even the sounds of the vicar’s shouting were lost to his own screams. And, oh, how he screamed. Crowley screamed and screamed and screamed, every atom in his corporation vibrating madly to escape the binding on them. He’d been in pain before, he’d even discorporated several times while still trying to figure out the whole human body thing, but nothing could compare with the exquisite agony of the hollow space inside him that once contained a Presence thousands of years past being filled once more by Her holiest of agents. 

Crowley threw his head back, shouts echoing louder than the strained panting of the priest. Everything inside him begged to get away and he fought uselessly against his restraints. The power that the binding sigils held at bay roiled at the edges of his corporation, snarling at his physical being. The demon gave in to its insistent pressure and let go. 

And then the world exploded. 

A crescendo of cracking and crashing overwhelmed Crowley’s screams and the vicar’s prayers, ringing through the small space with a deafening roar. Heavy objects slammed into the crossing of the church, throwing the demon to his back. With both arms thrown over his head, he tried to fend off of the largest pieces, the power that had been snapping at his edges now cocooning him in an electrified embrace. Something slammed into his right leg, but Crowley didn’t have the breath to scream anymore.

When awareness filtered back through to the demon, he realized that it hadn’t actually been the entire world which had crashed down. Instead, Crowley opened his eyes to see that he’d brought the roof down. Quite literally. Chunks of masonry and support beams buried the crossing, spreading out into the nave, choir, and transepts. The starry sky above shown through the hole left behind, on prominent display for anyone who cared to look up. 

Sandalphon lay amongst the debris, top half buried under the collapsed bell-cot, clearly discorporated; at least, Crowley assumed that not even an Archangel’s corporation could survive a crushed skull. The demon couldn’t see the vicar from where he lay within the summoning circle, but the absence of any other presences told him that the man was also dead. With a sharp stab of spite, Crowley hoped the vicar had earned himself a toasty place in hell. 

The demon sat up, muscles twitching spastically as he came down from the exorcism and roof collapse. A long beam lay across his right leg and he glowered at it, hoping that it would get the message and remove itself from his person. It didn’t. He briefly considered lying back down and letting himself recover for a while before the memory of Sandalphon’s threats against Aziraphale spilled back into his head. The resulting rush of adrenaline was enough to give Crowley the impetus he needed to haul the beam off of his leg. 

“Come on!” he cursed, lifting the heavy wood millimeters at a time. A tinkle of small stones still falling from the decimated roof punctuated Crowley’s grunts as he inched himself towards freedom. “Ach!”

With a resounding  _ crash!  _ and a cloud of dust, the demon threw the beam to the side. He fell back, panting from exertion. The stars above swam drunkenly across the sky before coalescing back into the form he had designed a lifetime ago. He stared up at the moon, trying to figure out why there was a growing pain in his leg. 

“You have to get up,” the demon told himself. “Nevermind the bum leg, there’s an angel to save.”

Almost as an afterthought, Crowley cut off feeling to anything below his right knee. Immediately, his head cleared and he was able to lever himself back up. Staggering to his feet was a bit more difficult, however, and it took the demon several tries before he managed anything even approaching the definition of upright. Once he was certain that his knee wasn’t going to buckle under, twin shadows erupted from his back, coalescing into black feathers. Crowley’s wings spread to their limits, beating against the air once, twice, three times before managing to lift off. Without a backward glance, the demon shot into the cool autumn air and towards a presence he would recognize on any plane of existence. 

It had been nearly a century since Crowley had the chance to. He marveled at the feeling of air rushing past his pinions as he struggled against a headwind. A signpost caught his frantic attention and Crowley tucked his wings in to dive down towards it. He landed heavily and immediately overbalanced, falling to his knees in the dewy grass. Through a cloud of pain and panic, the demon glanced up at the signpost and cursed when he saw information for the M27. Somewhere west of Portsmouth then. With a groan, Crowley realized that it would take him much too long to fly the distance. Aziraphale was most likely in grave danger while he sat here on his ass in the twice damned English countryside. With a groan, the demon realized the only thing left for it was to move himself. Black wings winched back into the celestial plane and with a blink, the demon willed himself out of existence.

* * *

Miles away, in the ruins of Saint Marinos Church, a young vicar sat up. 

“Oh dear,” he swore upon realising that his body hadn’t followed him. He looked down at the red-stained robes, torn in the center of his abdomen where a splintered beam that once supported the roof had impaled him. “That doesn’t look good.”

INdEED a deep voice agreed. 

“Who’s there?” the vicar asked, scrambling to his knees, or where he imagined his knees to be. Now that he thought about it, he didn’t actually have a body anymore. But he blinked out of habit anyway. 

A tall figure in dark robes stood before him, leaning against one of the remaining arches. COME. 

“You’re not what I imagined,” the vicar said simply, thinking back to the years he had spent asking deep questions about life and death in seminary. 

NO the figure agreed. 

“Do I go to heaven now?” the vicar couldn’t help the pleading note that invaded the memory of his voice. He had spent so many years certain of life after death. And now that it had come, he found himself thoroughly out of his depth. 

YOU GO TO ETERNAL REST the figure told him. BEYOND THAT, I DO NOT KNOW.

“I was killed trying to exorcise a demon. I bloody well better gain entrance to heaven.”

The figure strode over to the vicar, looming with a height that refused to be defined. Upon closer inspection, the young man realized that his robes weren’t just black, but seemingly made from a complete absence of light that drew everything into it. Two soulfire eyes gazed out from a bleached skull beneath his hood. The skeleton raised one bony hand to rest on where the vicar’s shoulder had been in life. YOU ARE NOT THE FIRST TO DIE BY HIS HAND, NOR WILL YOU BE THE LAST. THE CAUSE OF YOUR DEATH, HOWEVER, IS IMMATERIAL TO THE UNIVERSE. NOW, COME.

With a full body shudder which reminded him that he no longer had a body, the vicar fell forward into Death. “Did I suffer?” he asked as an afterthought. 

CERTAINLY NOT the skeleton promised. Two great wings sprung from his back, covering the length of the church in a shadow as old as creation. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1A few more examples for this analogy include but are not limited to: terms and conditions, training exercises, trust building, bank reconciliation, best practices, client-oriented, and the customer is always right.[return to text]  
> 2The idea that Death will allow the recently deceased to challenge him to a game for their soul has been around for centuries and is entirely incorrect. At his core, Death is nothing more than a delivery man, shuttling the dead from one plane of existence to another and is consequently about as influential to the plans of the Almighty as a ferry captain is to city planning. However, Death is fond of Karnöffel and Monopoly and so never put a stop to the rumors.[return to text]


	3. Chapter 3

If one were to ask Sir Snuffles if he was a good boy, the little dog would have yapped once and wagged his tail. After all, he quite liked his life. He had a little bed by the radiator and got away with sneaking up onto the four poster whenever his humans finally fell asleep. And on the rare occasions when he had been especially good, they let him have scraps from the table or the leftover bacon grease from dinner. It did horrible things to his intestines, but given that this and the maine coon next door were the only issues that the little mutt faced in his daily existence, Sir Snuffles didn’t mind. The downside of his rumbling intestines, however, was being put out in the middle of the night to ‘take care of his business’ as the humans said. Which is how the dog found himself in the average patch of tall grass surrounding Blackthorn Cottage. 

It was a good patch of grass and just tall enough to hide him completely. Concealed in the grass, he could sneak up on all manner of creatures, though the bell on his collar usually scared them off before he got too close. The little dog didn’t mind; after all, it wasn’t catching the thing that mattered, but the thrill of the chase. Coincidentally, this was also his life philosophy concerning his tail, rubber balls, and moving car tires. 

Tonight, however, the tall grass could do nothing to protect him as the barrier of goodwill around the little cottage at the end of the lane exploded outward. Sir Snuffles yapped loudly in indignation as two figures flashed down to either side of him, scaring the last of his indigestion out of him and onto his hind legs. Neither of the figures paid him any mind as they stalked towards the cottage, swords materializing in their glowing hands. 

The dog pursued them, yapping loudly and nipping at their exposed ankles. Nowhere in the midst of the Sir Snuffles mind did it occur to him that this was a bad idea. You have to understand that deep within his panicked doggy brain existed all the hatred and aggression that small dogs typically harbor against anything bigger than them[1] and it was telling him to do the one thing he did best: chase. 

Unfortunately, any understanding of the dog’s psyche did little to stop one of the figures from snapping their fingers with a dull echo. The last yap of Sir Snuffles the dog disappeared on the breeze that blew two avenging angels into the protected circle of a slumbering cottage. 

* * *

Crowley flashed into existence in the center of the transport sigil he had drawn on the front walk, wounded leg immediately buckling beneath him as it became reacquainted with solid ground. Growling in desperation, the demon willed his body forward as he stumbled to his feet and across the uneven flagstone path. 

The front door of their little cottage had been blown open, dangling precariously from only the top hinge. It swung drunkenly into Crowley as he lurched through the open doorway and the demon blessed loudly. Inside, books, smashed plants, and the remains of the hall stand littered the entryway. Several sigils lining the floor and ceiling still glowed faintly with discharged power. The wards had done their job then or at least, for his angel’s sake, Crowley hoped their limited protections had bought Aziraphale enough time to run. 

A familiar shout distracted the demon from the shattered remains of their home. “Aziraphale,” he gasped in recognition and his heart sank; the angel hadn't got away then. Injuries be damned, Crowley threw himself towards the garden. Urgency and gut-wrenching fear were the only thing that kept him upright as he ran towards the sounds of a fight. 

Gabriel’s corporation lay slumped in front of the back door. One side of his body broken and blackened, it was immediately obvious to Crowley that the Archangel had taken the brunt of the wards’ damage. But it was Aziraphale’s best sushi knife between his ribs that had been the Archangel’s undoing. Or, at least, his earthly body’s undoing. If the situation wasn’t so dire, Crowley would have smiled with grim satisfaction. That was a hell of a way to go and promised so much paperwork. But he didn’t have the attention to spare so he stepped over the prone body without a second thought, barreling into the garden. 

Michael stood in the scattered remains of his strawberry bed, looming over Aziraphale. The Principality had been driven to his knees amidst the soil, fending off the Archangel’s sword with the pole to the bird feeder. Great white wings flapped behind Aziraphale, trying to get the momentum he needed to regain his feet. In a flash of white light, the angel batted Michael’s sword away, sending it skittering across the garden. He swung the pole back around, aimed for her head, but he’d swung too wide and Michael closed the distance in an instant. One hand reached out to grapple Aziraphale’s left wing and the other materialized a short sword. The Principality had a split second to gaze up in horrored realization before the sword flashed down in a deadly arc. 

“No!” Crowley screeched, painfully aware of what came next. They couldn’t do this to his angel, to one of their own. The demon launched himself at Michael, all sense of self-preservation fleeing as he clawed at her. While he had never been much of a fighter, he had seen enough wars and fist-fights over the eons to get the general idea.[2] Crowley went straight for the wings. One hand ripped out great fistfuls of angelic feathers and the other snaked around Michael’s neck, throwing her off balance. With a startled cry, the Archangel stumbled back, losing her grip on the short sword as it bit into Aziraphale’s wing. Crowley’s enraged cry was easily overshadowed by his angel’s scream. Aziraphale fell forward on his hands and knees, sobbing. Blood oozed from around the blade still buried in the wing joint, staining the angel’s feathers a dark scarlet. Crowley renewed his attack, trying to drag Michael away from the vulnerable angel. 

“In the name of the Almighty, release me!” Michael shrieked. Holy light poured from her corporation, illuminating the garden like the noonday sun. Crowley was forced to let go or be burnt up in its holy brilliance. He fell to his ass in the vegetable bed, smoke curling off of him for the second time that night. A sixth sense ignited somewhere deep inside the demon and he scrambled backwards on his elbows just in time to escape the hand of the Archangel coming down on him with all the wrath of heaven behind it. 

“That name hasn’t compelled me for six thousand years!” Crowley gasped out even as he fled. 

Michael’s advance came to a sudden halt and she swayed on her feet, looking down in surprise. The demon followed her gaze to see the sword she had wielded against Aziraphale buried in the muscles of her thigh. The leg buckled beneath the Archangel and Crowley seized the opportunity to scramble out of smiting range. 

Aziraphale knelt behind his former boss, panting heavily against the pain of his mangled wing as he yanked the blade back out. Michael shouted in pained indignation, one arm cradling her injury and the other flying up to latch onto Aziraphale’s injured wing. But this time the Principality was faster, pushing to his feet in a surge of power to stand over her. Righteous anger flashed in his eyes. “I was counted among the cherubim once and I still remember how to use this. Please do not make me discorporate you in my own home,” he pleaded as much as he threatened. 

For a torturous moment, Crowley was sure that Michael would continue fighting as she teetered on the edge of action. But then the Archangel raised both hands in surrender, looked to Heaven, and flashed upwards in a streak of light. 

“So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen!” the demon yelled after her. 

When Crowley could once again see around the spots dancing in his vision, the garden was empty save for him and Aziraphale, who let the sword fall from his grasp at the realization that they were alone. The clatter of the angelic blade against the scattered remains of Crowley's strawberry garden broke the demon from his stunned stupor and he surged forward to his angel.

Aziraphale’s left wing hung limply from his shoulder, cut down to the bone and with a deep gouge splintering part of the joint. Crowley reached for it, but stopped several inches away when the angel flinched and pitched forward to his knees. The demon sank down along with him, hovering in case his husband collapsed completely. 

“Urgh,” Aziraphale groaned, injured wing sprawling against the ground. He looked back at the injury and what little colour remained in his sweating face fled completely, leaving behind a sickly pallor. “That’s a bit not good.” 

The quip seemed to sap the angel’s remaining strength and he fell forward with a woozy groan. Crowley was waiting for him, tucking Aziraphale’s face into one shoulder and supporting his back with both hands. The angel’s arms hung freely, bloody knuckles just barely scraping the ground. 

“Aziraphale!” Crowley yelled to the bundle of feathers and blood in his arms. “Wake up, you great pillock!” 

The angel shuddered, muscles twitching in cyclical rhythm. Both angel and demon knelt in the remnants of their back garden, one trying to maintain a tenuous grasp on consciousness and the other trying desperately not to panic. Finally, Aziraphale managed to push himself back up onto his knees, hands braced against Crowley’s chest. 

“What do I do?” the demon could hear himself panicking. ‘What do I do?”

Aziraphale didn’t respond, reaching up to clutch at his injured wing with one hand. Fingers slipped against blood-slick feathers and over fractured bone to grasp exposed blood vessels. With a muffled shout of pain, the angel clamped down on the injury, hand already stained with his own blood. 

It’s red, Crowley thought with something approaching desperation, his blood is red. Both the angel and the demon had been present at several of each other’s discorporations and had consequently become intimately aware of how human bodies expired.[3] But that didn’t mean that seeing such a human substance staining each other’s forms became any less harrowing as the years passed. In the back of his mind, Crowley always expected to see the metallic ichor of the Angelic Host every time his own angel bled. But the human red that oozed between Aziraphale’s fingers and filled his nostrils with the stink of iron reminded the demon exactly what was at stake. 

Crowley reached out the last few inches to cover the angel’s hand with his own. Reaching deep inside him to where his core of being thrummed with an otherworldly energy, the demon pulled on something that he hadn’t used in over 6000 years. Energy began to flow from within Crowley, out through where his fingers clamped like a vice around Aziraphale’s hand, and into the wing.

To the observer who could look at the sight and then look again with an eye that didn’t see, the angel and demon glowed with power, auras pulsing as they mingled in the dim light of the garden. It was truly a sight to behold and one that hadn’t occurred since the days before the creation of the Earth. But to the average human observer wholly ignorant of the preternatural, they would only have seen muscle and flesh knit back together beneath the entwined hands of an angel and a demon. 

Aziraphale moaned piteously against the feeling of raw nerves meeting and reconnecting, muscle fibers smashing back together before smoothing themselves over, and slashed blood vessels rejoining with a warm thrill of renewed flow. The bent and sliced feathers were a lost cause and under Crowley’s careful direction, they fell to the ground in a small heap. Aziraphale rolled his shoulder, feeling the recently healed flight muscles unknot and lay still. The flow of power still coursed through his body despite the damage fading into memory.

“You can stop now, dear boy,” he muttered, looking up for the first time to meet Crowley’s gaze. But the demon’s eyes were focused on his wing, stare empty of any recognition. “Crowley?”

Crowley shuddered at the sound of his name, hand falling away and the flow of power finally tapering off until it stopped completely, leaving Aziraphale with a strange feeling of hollowness.

“‘ngel?” the demon slurred softly. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt this way. Even before the Fall, healing had never taken this much out of him. Part of his mind wondered if that was because his ability to heal had been supposed to have been stripped from him at the same time as his Grace. Whatever the cause of the sudden exhaustion that flooded through him, it didn’t make a difference. He was going to be introduced to the ground soon enough either way. 

As Crowley swayed on his knees, he became aware of his core spreading out from within him, rushing to his extremities as if it could escape his earthly corporation. And, with a start, the demon realized that this was exactly what was happening. 

“What have you done?!” A voice filtered down to the demon as if from a great height. "Crowley? Crowley! Oh, fuck." And for the third time in his existence, Aziraphale swore.

It was the last thing Crowley heard before he tipped forward. He remained conscious long enough to experience smashing nose first into Azriphale’s jumper clad collarbone with a small spark of pain that did nothing to ward off the grey cloud obscuring his vision. Hands grappled with his suddenly limp and heavy form, trying to keep him from slumping to the muddy ground. The demon was cradled into a warm chest, the base of his skull cupped in a plump hand. And then blissful nothingness shut down the rest of his senses. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1Which is most things.[return to text]  
> 2His stint as the Black Knight had taken a mix of mediocre posturing, creative storytelling, several demonic interventions, and one memorable occasion in which he had bribed a young duke to poise as him for a tournament. [return to text]  
> 3Several of the memorable ones had included being mauled by a lion (Crowley), bitten by a snake (Crowley), and fallen victim to the Black Death (Aziraphale, also one of the reasons why Crowley hated the 14th century).[return to text]


	4. Chapter 4

Crowley awoke to the call of gulls and the distant crash of waves. He could hear the whistle of a kettle from the kitchen below and the familiarity of it all nearly soothed him back to sleep. But the events directly before he lost recollection slammed back into the demon with a heart-wrenching lurch. He sat up in alarm, or at least he tried to sit up in alarm before realizing that his body wasn’t cooperating. Instead, Crowley crumpled in on himself, canted sideways, and fell off the bed with a thunderous  _ thump _ . The demon stared at the floorboards his nose was smooshed into, trying to figure out how to extricate the arm he had landed on. 

“Crowley!” a shout followed by footsteps pounding up the stairs was the only warning the demon got before Aziraphale burst through the door to their bedroom. The angel’s gait stuttered briefly at the sight of the empty bed before he rounded the corner to see Crowley in a twisted heap on the floor. “Oh my dear!”

“Yeah, yeah” Crowley huffed irritably. “Stop gawking and help me up!”

Aziraphale crouched next to the fallen demon, arranging sluggish limbs as he tried to sort Crowley out into a manageable position. For his part, the demon allowed himself to be manhandled, more than a little alarmed at how heavy and uncoordinated he felt. 

“Up you go,” the angel grunted as he hoisted Crowley up into a seated position and then towards the bed. The demon’s legs dragged behind him like twin anchors, threatening to take him back down. With a sigh, Aziraphale readjusted his grip to keep Crowley from falling once more. His head ended up pillowed in the crook of the angel’s elbow and an arm hooked beneath his trailing knees, lifting him bodily back onto the mattress. Both angel and demon took a moment to catch their breath before maneuvering Crowley into a comfortable position beneath the duvet. 

“What are we still doing here?” Crowley questioned, sinking into the waiting pile of pillows with a groan. “They smashed through our defences. We should be halfway to Scotland by now!” 

“Not all of them,” Aziraphale corrected. He waved his hand in a complicated gesture and the distinct feeling of wards washed over Crowley’s occult senses. “Several were left intact and I strengthened and added to them wherever I could once you weren’t in immediate danger of dispcorporating. It won’t do much against the full fury of either of our sides, but it should stop at least the first offensive. Give us long enough to get out.” 

Crowley swallowed past a suddenly too large tongue and dry mouth, “Discorporating?” 

“Yes,” Aziraphale mumbled lowly, reaching out to clasp his husband’s hand. “Between the injures and exhaustion, you really overdid it. Burnt through all of your reserves and started using your own core before I managed to stop you.”

“No wonder I’m so tired,” the demon groaned. 

“Quite,” the angel agreed. He was silent for a moment, staring down at the spindly fingers clutched within his own. Crowley was about to ask for a glass of water when Aziraphale sucked in a breath and looked up into the demon’s uncovered eyes, “why did you never tell me?”

That was not what Crowley had been expecting at all. “Tell you what?” he asked, thoroughly confused. 

“Who you were before you Fell.”

Ah, Crowley inhaled sharply, that. He glanced off to the side to avoid seeing the look on his husband’s face, staring out the window at the dark landscape instead. “It never seemed important; all in the past as they say. Plus I didn’t think I could heal anyone besides myself until tonight.” 

Aziraphale cleared his throat awkwardly, “try last week.”

“What?!” 

“You have been unconscious for nearly a week,” the angel clarified. 

“Damn. Slept right through our Honeymoon.”

They were quiet for another moment before Aziraphale tipped his husband’s face back towards him. “I would prefer to have known,” he told him, not to be deterred from the subject. 

“And I would prefer to forget, but here we are,” Crowley ripped his chin from the angel’s hand and turned back to the window sullenly. 

“It makes sense,” Aziraphale pushed on. “You once mentioned hanging the stars and your aura has always been so strong for your rank, but I never- I didn’t think- I always knew Raphael Fell, but I never thought-” 

“Don’t!” Crowley cut him off. “That’s not my name. It was never truly meant to be my name, I was always predestined to Fall.” 

Aziraphale didn’t try to argue. In fact, he didn’t say anything as he crawled fully onto the bed to lay beside Crowley, gathering the demon up into his arms. “That never mattered to me,” he shushed quietly when they were settled into an entwined heap. 

“I know.”

“Good.”

Crowley snuggled deeper into the embrace, for once not complaining about the show of affection. He was halfway to drifting off back to sleep when his right leg spasmed. He cursed, drawing the limb closer to his body and pushing away from Aziraphale. Probing fingers were met with a dry bandage and the disconcerting feeling of muscles clenched against his will. The demon tried to imagine that there was nothing but smooth skin and sinuous muscles beneath the bandage, but something deep within him tugged painfully at the small park of Will and he whimpered. A heavy-headed dizziness invaded his brain and what little strength he had managed to regain in his limbs fled back into him. The room began to spin before Crowley’s unfocused eyes and his form pressed heavily into the sheet beneath him.

“None of that now,” Aziraphale reproached, pulling Crowley up to sit against his chest. “I’ve just got you back.”

“My leg,” Crowley grit out around the pain and exhaustion. His voice sounded pathetically weak even to his own ringing ears.

“Ah, yes,” the angel replied, tone suddenly sheepish. “I healed the most serious injuries, but between strengthening the wards and stabilizing your core, well, I just-I didn’t have enough. I don’t have the predilection for healing that you apparently do.”

Crowley hummed in response, allowing one of Aziraphale’s soft hands to brace his head against a shoulder. He stared up at the ceiling, watching as phantom flames curled around the edges of his vision. Suddenly exhausted beyond belief and afraid of what his brain would see next, he barely managed to mutter “I’m going to sleep now” before tipping back into an unconsciousness plagued by the promise of fire and severed wings. 

When Crowley next woke from his fitful slumber, it was to a gentle but insistent hand sliding along his scales. The serpent flicked a tongue out, disconcerted to find himself in this form without having consciously directed the change. This was becoming a habit. 

“I need you to let me up, dear boy,” the voice of Aziraphale gently soothed. 

Instinctually, Crowley tightened his coils. He could feel a soft body give beneath him as he did and a harsh exhale of air  _ wooshed _ somewhere near his head. The snake immediately relaxed with an apologetic hiss. 

“Really now?” the angel groused as soon as he got the breath to form words back into his lungs. 

Crowley hissed low in reply as he unwound himself from Aziraphale’s chest and slithered onto the cold sheets beside him. Scales receded into a rapidly widening and shortening body and then Crowley’s human corporation was lounging next to his husband on their bed, sleep pants hopelessly creased. “Ssssorry,” he garbled out around the lingering hiss. 

Aziraphale paid no mind to the demon’s sheepish expression as he clambered, still fully clothed, out of bed. A small pile of books on the nightstand told Crowley that he had likely been there for a while. 

“If you think you can manage the trip,” Aziraphale told him as he straightened out his wrinkled coat with a snap. “I believe now would be a good time to retire to London.”

“Retire?” Crowley asked, alarmed. 

The angel reached over to rest a comforting hand on the demon’s shoulder. “Just a figure of speech, my dear. I merely believe it would be a good idea to stay in London while the wards are strengthened here. Ms. Device has kindly agreed to see to that this week.” 

“Oh,” Crowley clambered out of bed to follow the angel, trying to ignore the lingering heaviness of exhaustion in his limbs. It took him a good bit to safely navigate the stairs and when he finally padded into the sitting room, he was greeted with the sight of Aziraphale bustling around the built-in shelves, packing away the sentimental pieces he displayed there. The demon was also pleasantly surprised to see that the majority of the damage to the main living area had been repaired, little trace remaining of the wards’ wreckage. 

The demon tried his best to help Aziraphale pack up their valuables, but after one too many near misses with dropping some Mesopotamian pottery, the angel forced him onto the couch and out from underfoot. Crowley could only watch as his husband ran around their cottage like a chicken with his head cut off. Finally, the backseat of the Bentley was fit to burst with whatever Aziraphale could think to save. The demon was honestly amazed that he had managed to fit so much in without using miracles, but nothing in the backseat resonated the holy aura that he had come to associate with his husband.[1] With a pang, Crowley realized that this also meant that none of the angel’s religious tests had made it into the car. 

“Angel,” he breathed out gently, easing himself into the passenger seat. “Your books-”

“None of that now,” Aziraphale interrupted him, clambering in behind the wheel. “I know how they affect you and frankly, dear boy, you are more important than some silly old books anyhow.”

Stunned into complete silence for the second time in his life, Crowley didn’t even realize when Aziraphale started the car and pulled out of the lane. In fact, he was silent all the way to London, staring out at the passing countryside. He barely even looked up when Aziraphale manhandled him out of the car, into the familiar bookshop, and onto the comfy couch in the backroom. Crowley, curled into the cushions, supposed he should help Aziraphale unload the Bentley in the brief moment he managed to stay conscious, but he was asleep before the angel could bring in the first box. 

* * *

Being in London again was both a blessing and a curse. It provided Crowley ample time to sulk around St. James park, tempting stupid adults to get too close to the swans and reveling in the havoc of some hapless MI5 agent attempting to recruit another man who would turn out to be an MI6 agent, much to the embarrassment of both. It had been much too long since he had been able to get up to mischief and the demon had started to slide into what could only be described as a metaphysical withdrawal from evil. It was downright uncomfortable and made him sweat in places that would ruin his favorite trousers. But in London, he could easily fix that problem.

Crowley milled around the city center aimlessly, stopping long enough to leave lewd graffiti on 10 Downing St. before making the familiar circuit through to Trafalgar Square. Defacing public property was generally something that the demon had considered beneath him since the fall of the Roman Empire, but it boosted his spirits enough to warm him up for the main act.[2] Even with his core still recovering, Crowley was able to execute a few well-timed and well-placed interventions that fouled up the underground during peak hours. The resulting wave of low-grade evil that washed over London hit him like the cusp of a chemical high, chasing away the lightheaded feeling that he had nursed for the past few weeks. 

The demon smiled salaciously as he watched the news coverage from a comfortable spot in the midst of Aziraphale’s ancient feather bed. It was all so delightfully chaotic and he had caused it. Hell might be on bad terms with him for the moment, but nothing changed the fact that he was a demon and nearly as creative as humans in his own right. 

“I could smell the evil all the way from the kitchen,” Aziraphale tutted by way of greeting as he bustled in with a steaming pot of tea. “Do I want to know what you’ve done now?”

“Oh, just a small temptation here, the complete malfunction of the tube there,” Crowley answered gleefully, imagining that his tea was a smooth brandy instead of the herbal concoction Aziraphale had most recently taken a liking to. It was tea again by the time the rim of the cup met his lips. The demon shot his husband a glare. 

Aziraphale, wholly unaffected by any of Crowley’s impressive glowers, ignored him. “The usual then?”

“Just something to lift my spirits.”

“Well, your presence certainly has grown stronger,” it was clear that though he was pleased to see Crowley recover, the angel would likely never approve of good honest evil. Aziraphale settled onto the bed next to the still tittering demon, propping open a tome and settling in for the night. The exhaustion of the day stole up on Crowley before he was ready, and the demon snuffled off into sleep still clutching his phone. 

It was dark when Crowley next awoke. The spot beside him was cold and the covers thrown back hastily. Something was wrong. The demon listened for a moment before sitting up, trying to figure out where Aziraphale had gone. His mind whirred with all the horrible possibilities while the last remaining vestiges of his reason tried to convince him that the angel had likely gone for a nightcap or a midnight snack. 

Without further internal argument, Crowley crawled out of bed. The floorboards beneath his feet were warm and the demon was about to put it down to the unusually late heatwave that Southern England had been suffering through until the sound of crackling crowded out all other senses. Oh no, he thought bitterly to himself, not again. 

“Aziraphale!” with a cry Crowley bounded out the door, through the hall, and down the stairs. Taking the steps two at a time, he burst onto the ground floor to be enveloped in a wall of heat. Fire burned in a ring around the center of the room, lighting up a dread sigil in the wooden floorboards. And in the middle of that sigil lay Aziraphale. The angel was face down, partially obscuring the severed wing that smoldered in the fire beneath him. A bloody stump was all that remained of the once proud wing, splintered bone and muscle glistening through the jaggedly torn flesh. 

One arm raised over his eyes to shield them from jumping embers, Crowley crept closer until he was right on the edge of the burning sigil. The flames that licked out at him caused the hairs on his arm to curl, but didn’t hurt him in the least. Hellfire. This was hellfire. And his husband was in the middle of it. The demon fell to his knees on the edge of the circle, not trusting himself to reach out to the angel within.

Crowley jerked awake, panting for breath. A cold sweat soaked his brow and wet the pillow beneath him. He sat up, arms flailing for balance as he took in the familiar surroundings of the bedroom in the flat above Aziraphale’s bookshop. And, oh Satan,  _ Aziraphale _ . The familiar lump of angel beneath the ancient quilt met Crowley’s desperate hands and the demon nearly choked on his relief as his searching occult senses were overwhelmed with the angel’s presence. 

“Love?” Aziraphale murmured sleepily, turning over to look at Crowley. 

“Go to sleep, angel,” the demon soothed, just managing to suppress the panic in his voice. Aziraphale, either from the haze of sleep or actually believing Crowley’s deflection, rolled back over. Waiting until the angel’s breathing had resumed a deep, even pace, Crowley extricated himself from the duvet and padded quietly through the flat to the bookshop below. All the wards were intact, none of the perimeter alarms had gone off, and the sigils remained dormant. 

Crowley sunk into the coach with a disbelieving hiss. “All a dream, how can it all just be a dream?” he demanded. 

Nothing - no One - answered. He hadn’t expected them to. With a heavy sigh, the demon resigned himself to a sleepless night haunted by the fear that neither he nor his angel would ever truly be safe. 

* * *

It took them nearly a fortnight to make it back to the Downs and an unfamiliar feeling of trepidation unfurled in Crowley’s chest as he turned onto Marble Lane. Blackthorn Cottage stood at the end of the lane as whole and complete as the day he’d moved in. And now, he could practically feel the force of the occult protections even before he hit the property line. 

With a sigh of relief, Crowley pulled into the drive. “It feels good.” 

“Yes,” Aziraphale agreed. “Ms. Device certainly knows her magic.” 

Crowley didn’t bother to unload the car and willed the valuables they had brought with them to London directly back into their places. He ignored the pointed look that Aziraphale sent him as the books he had been clutching suddenly left his arms. 

When they opened the front door, it was to find the cottage impeccably clean and heavily warded. Anathema had even gone as far as leaving a small collection of succulents for Crowley and a tea mixture for Aziraphale. 

"This was awfully nice of her, she needn't have gone through the trouble." the angel commented as he inhaled the earthy scent of jasmine and green tea. "Not that I'm complaining."

Crowley grunted, surveying his own gift. It was rare for the demon to receive gifts and, in fact, he had never received a gift from anyone besides Aziraphale before now. The feeling was, odd, to say the least. Not entirely sure what he should do with it, the demon relocated the succulents to their dinner table and stared at them. 

“Those are lovely,” Aziraphale said a moment before one of his arms snaked around Crowley’s waist. “And it reminds me, I have something to show you.” 

“Oh?” Crowley asked, interest piqued. 

The angel led him back through the cottage and to a new attachment on the back end of their sitting room. A part of the wall had been knocked out to form an archway leading into a conservatory. The room wasn’t terribly large, but the windows practically gleamed as the sunlight streamed through them to light up the space. Plenty of shelves and tables lined the space, affording an ample amount of room for Crowley to work with. The demon stood in the entrance, trying to take it all in, clearly flummoxed despite the control he normally had over his reactions. 

“Do you like it?” Aziraphale sounded anxious. 

Crowley sucked in a breath, turning to pull his husband into an embrace. “It’s lovely. You shouldn’t have.” 

“Actually, I do believe I should have. This is your home, Crowley, and I want you to feel safe in it,” the angel couldn’t quite meet his eyes, but the sincerity in his voice told the demon everything. 

The demon didn’t thank him. At least not verbally. But the fact that Crowley immediately moved several of his choice houseplants into the new space spoke volumes in and of itself. Aziraphale smiled as he watched.

Elsewhere in the neighborhood, something softened. The cottages lining the lane seemed brighter, the gardens greener, flowering ivy bloomed over entryways across the region, and the trees turned a vibrant autumnal hue that had the local tourism board practically salivating at the advertisement possibilities. 

“I told you that cottage would be good for property values,” one man commented over the hedge to his neighbor.    
“I suppose so,” the neighbor agreed, watering a bunch of chrysanthemums that hadn’t been there that morning. “Though it would be nice if the Residence Committee stops with all these flowers. I don’t know how much more my allergies can handle.”

“John over on Cherry street says that that cottage’s garden would put even old man Henderson’s petunias to shame. And they’ve won best in show last three years running,” the first man continued. “Suppose the committee just wants to encourage a cohesive aesthetic.” 

His neighbor stopped to think about this for a moment, looking mournfully at the cheery autumn blooms surrounding him. It was like a flipping fairy tale, the ones with happy little girls and quaint forest cottages.[3] He sneezed miserably. “Sod all that.”

Unseen by either man, a haze of contentment settled over the surrounding properties like an early morning fog. Flowers bloomed left and right and the wildlife abounded, much to the consternation of the local countryside manager. Nothing in the near vicinity of the cottage at the end of the lane escaped untouched from the subtle change, not even the angel or the demon that now called this place home. 

* * *

A frog and a mountain hare skulked in the shadows of the distant treeline, surveying the cramped village with open disdain. The vegetation in a circle around them began to shrivel up under the force of their hatred and the other wildlife cleared out, leaving the patch of trees eerily still. 

“They failed,” observed the hare. 

“As we expected,” answered the frog. 

“Now what?” 

“Now we move forward with the plan.”

“And what is the plan exactly?” asked the hare, scratching furiously at the cloud of flies that erupted into a cloud around its coat. 

The flies drew together into one swirling mass, finally coalescing into the ruler of the demons. They crouched down to stare at the hare, errant flies still buzzing around their form. “The plan is not for you to know,” their voice would have been ominous had it not been for the echoing of the fly that flew into their mouth halfway through the explanation. 

“Hang on,” the frog interrupted when the other was done coughing. “I thought that was the Ineffable Plan?”

“No,” the ruler of demons corrected. “The Ineffable Plan is Unknowable whereas the entirety of this Plan is simply being withheld for security reasons.”

The hare, to an eye trained to expect human reactions from woodland animals, nodded. “Oh, that makes sense. But why call it the Plan then? That’s just asking for confusion.” 

“Mistakezzz were made,” the ruler of the demons acquiesced, voicing buzzing irritably. ‘“But this is not for you to question. You must simply do or die, for if you do not do then you will die, understood?”

“Got it,” the hare spun on the spot, growing upwards and settling into the corporation of a young woman. It looked like she was designed to be beautiful, but the artist who had created her had known about as much about woman as Michelangelo.[4] “Just one more thing. What exactly are my orders?”

“Get out there and cause some trouble,” the frog responded, rumbling the cruel irony of the statement through its deep croak. It’s wide mouth stretched into something that might have been a smile as it watched the lesser demon set out. This was going to be devilishly fun. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1The angel had managed to cram the majority of their ancient pottery collection, his favorite Egyptian glass Christmas baubles, his many first edition poetry tomes, the few remaining porcelain dishes that he had picked up in the Han dynasty, and Crowley’s favorite plants. [return to text]  
> 2Some of his last work had been memorialized in Pompeii and beneath the Colosseum, a fact the demon had managed to conceal from Aziraphale for the better part of two thousand years. However, this reticence for banal mischief had been thrown out the window during the difficulties of the 14th century and several of the works that remained to the present day still bore his often grotesque and entirely inappropriate marginalia. [return to text]  
> 3And not the ones with eyes getting pecked out or toes cut off. [return to text]  
> 4Art historians have argued for decades over the Michelangelo’s “Men with Breasts” representation of women. Some believe it was a political statement, others a theological one, and several scholars put it down to the artist being so deep in the closet that he regularly enjoyed tea in Narnia. Whatever the ultimate reason, the fact still remained that the yet-to-be-named demon who had previously been a hare looked to most like a poor amalgamation of parts configured to be perceptively human, vaguely feminine, and almost comically muscular. [return to text]
> 
> **Additional Notes: Ahh, the end of the second part of this triptych. Stay tuned for the last part of the story (once I figure out exactly where it's going) soon! As always, thank you for all the wonderful comments, kudos, and bookmarks. You guys are the best!**


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